Thanks again to those that followed this blog and I'll likely be starting up a new blog once SW:TOR launches.
Elune protect you....or rather, May the Force be with you.
Neotaeo
Seeing WoW though the eyes of a tank.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
It's been fun....
I wanted to thank those that followed me here and wanted to take a moment to say that I will not be posting here anymore. I've found that I'm just no longer having fun in WoW. It is just not the same game I started playing back in the classic days. There have become far too many elitist in game these days that have forgotten that to win, you need to work as a team. It doesn't matter if you top of the meters, if you didn't help in a different way when it was needed, and the group fails, you fail too. I have also decided to prepare for the launch of Star Wars: The Old Republic. I'm hanging up my tanking gear for a lightsaber, pretty fair trade if you ask me, lol.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Is Fandral's Flamescythe really worth it?
Ok, so we have all probably seen someone with Fandral's Flamescythe by now. A flaming cat hanging out in Stormwind or Orgrimmar, showing off their new look. But is it really worth it? Is this weapon more then just a gimmicky weapon put in by Blizzard? Lets examine the facts shall we...
Here is Fandral's Flamescythe:
Fandral's Flamescythe
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1428 - 2143 Damage Speed 2.40
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 276 (1.54% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 265 (1.48 @ L85).
We also know that the unlisted trick to this weapon is that druids using it get a new fiery cat form. Now, the stats are nice, very high and in the right spots. The mastery on it is nice and the critical strike always helps. But is this really worth going crazy to go after?
Well, if you like your fair share of PvP, another weapon in your grasp can be:
Ruthless Gladiator's Staff
Season 10
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1190 - 1786 Damage Speed 2.00
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 272 (1.52% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 272 (3.44% @ L85).
or
Ruthless Gladiator's Pike
Season 10
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Polearm
2142 - 3215 Damage Speed 3.60
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 272 (1.52% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 272 (3.44% @ L85).
Now, you do lose out on the mastery on these 2 choices, but although mastery is a nice stat to have, it's not the top stat in most builds at the moment. You can always reforge to get some mastery back, but ultimately, the 265 mastery that the Fandral's Flamescythe gives you does not actually translate in to that much of an improvement. You have to remember that 265 does not translate in to actually 265 more mastery. It gets tossed in to the conversion tables like all other stats and then the correct amount is added to your stats.
Now, if you do not have access to or do not like to PvP, there is always "
Witch-Hunter's Harvester
Binds when equipped
Two-Hand Polearm
1614 - 3000 Damage Speed 3.50
(659.2 damage per second)
+361 Agility
+541 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 365
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 241 (1.34% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 241 (1.34 @ L85).
Ok, I know what you are going to say. And yes, the ilvl and stats are lower. But look at the big picture here and not the numbers on the polearm. You are only losing out on 47 agility, 70 stamina, 35 critical strike and 24 mastery. If you were to add these missing amounts to your stats you would see almost no change in your over all stats. For example, 70 stamina is only going to give you about 700 more health over all. In today's WoW, 700 health doesn't make a ton of difference, or really any at all.
If you sit back and do that over all math and run that numbers in your stats, you can see that, unless the staff drops while you are in there anyways, it does not seem that Fandral's Flamescythe is the end all/be all of weapons in the game for druids at this point. Sure the higher stats and ilvl numbers all make it the "best" weapon in game for druids. But if you stand back and look at it for what it really is, the shine on it seems to die down and it's not really that awesome of a weapon. Now if you want a weapon that will change you form, then this is simple the best for you. I feel that this just isn't worth farming for.
If you have any questions or comments you'd like to make on this topic, please feel free to comment. I will respond to any and all questions posted here. If you like this or any of my other topics, please follow me. You can also find me on twitter @neosroar.
Here is Fandral's Flamescythe:
Fandral's Flamescythe
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1428 - 2143 Damage Speed 2.40
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 276 (1.54% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 265 (1.48 @ L85).
We also know that the unlisted trick to this weapon is that druids using it get a new fiery cat form. Now, the stats are nice, very high and in the right spots. The mastery on it is nice and the critical strike always helps. But is this really worth going crazy to go after?
Well, if you like your fair share of PvP, another weapon in your grasp can be:
Ruthless Gladiator's Staff
Season 10
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1190 - 1786 Damage Speed 2.00
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 272 (1.52% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 272 (3.44% @ L85).
or
Ruthless Gladiator's Pike
Season 10
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Polearm
2142 - 3215 Damage Speed 3.60
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 272 (1.52% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your resilience rating by 272 (3.44% @ L85).
Now, you do lose out on the mastery on these 2 choices, but although mastery is a nice stat to have, it's not the top stat in most builds at the moment. You can always reforge to get some mastery back, but ultimately, the 265 mastery that the Fandral's Flamescythe gives you does not actually translate in to that much of an improvement. You have to remember that 265 does not translate in to actually 265 more mastery. It gets tossed in to the conversion tables like all other stats and then the correct amount is added to your stats.
Now, if you do not have access to or do not like to PvP, there is always "
Witch-Hunter's Harvester
Binds when equipped
Two-Hand Polearm
1614 - 3000 Damage Speed 3.50
(659.2 damage per second)
+361 Agility
+541 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 365
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 241 (1.34% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 241 (1.34 @ L85).
Ok, I know what you are going to say. And yes, the ilvl and stats are lower. But look at the big picture here and not the numbers on the polearm. You are only losing out on 47 agility, 70 stamina, 35 critical strike and 24 mastery. If you were to add these missing amounts to your stats you would see almost no change in your over all stats. For example, 70 stamina is only going to give you about 700 more health over all. In today's WoW, 700 health doesn't make a ton of difference, or really any at all.
If you sit back and do that over all math and run that numbers in your stats, you can see that, unless the staff drops while you are in there anyways, it does not seem that Fandral's Flamescythe is the end all/be all of weapons in the game for druids at this point. Sure the higher stats and ilvl numbers all make it the "best" weapon in game for druids. But if you stand back and look at it for what it really is, the shine on it seems to die down and it's not really that awesome of a weapon. Now if you want a weapon that will change you form, then this is simple the best for you. I feel that this just isn't worth farming for.
If you have any questions or comments you'd like to make on this topic, please feel free to comment. I will respond to any and all questions posted here. If you like this or any of my other topics, please follow me. You can also find me on twitter @neosroar.
Friday, July 22, 2011
Racism in Warcraft? Really?
Todays blog is going to be a bit off topic as far as tanking information is concerned.....
I read a paper someone had written for a class of some sort about racism in the World of Warcraft. I read the article and was just totally taken back. First off, the persons information was based on what other people thought and said. Out of all that, half the information was completely wrong. For example, "The Darkspear trolls are clearly portrayed as weak since they were defeated by little merlocs and driven from their home." This was just a small part of how they are portraying a section of our population in a negative way (I'll link the article at the bottom of this blog.). Now I'm not one to nitpick stuff too badly, but when you are going to make a claim that anything is racist, you had better make sure your facts are in order and verified. I think the biggest comment made by the author that condemned the entire paper was when he stated "I'd buy this game if they made some changes to remove the racist elements". This right here states that he has not played it or not for any length of time that would allow a person to gather data to form a conclusion based on first hand knowledge.
Ok, now with that aspect out of the way.....
How in the wide wide world of sports could a game be racist? It is based in a fake world where fake events happen based on fake evolutions/intergalactic nudging or evolution or species and how they interact with the world around them. To say that anything in a game such as WoW is, in my opinion, racist is completely absurd. People create things by taking elements from the world around them. If you look at every character in WoW, you can see a mixing of cultures in each race. They all have good sides and dark pasts, this is what gives things in the game a bit more depth. But to sit back and say that the troll race represents 1 specific race here in the real world is ludicrous at best. Why does it have to be about race in everything? Why? Please, to all my readers, please just enjoy the game you are playing. If you still play WoW, enjoy it. If you are getting ready for SW:TOR, then when you get it, enjoy it. Don't pick apart a game and try to compare it to the real world. It's a game, a place to leave the world around us to play in a totally different environment where we can just have fun. Picking it apart only ruins and destroys a apart of the game that you can never get back. Once you go down the path of picking things apart, you will not be able to look at the fun world you play in the same way again.
Here is the paper that was written: http://www.cjritter.com/dissertation/ Please feel free to express here in the comment section if you agree or disagree with me. All comments will be posted here as long as they are not rude or profane.
Please remember that this is my opinion and not to be taken as fact. This is my feelings and opinions on the subject and I felt the need to express it here. If you enjoy my blog, please take a moment to follow me, I'm also on twitter @neosroar.
Friday, July 8, 2011
Firelands and you. New Shinies things for feral tanks.
With the release of The Firelands raid in 4.2, please are all climbing over each other to get in there and see what they can get off each boss. Now sure, the new dungeon journal gives you a full loot table off each boss, but I've taken some time and made up what I call my "Firelands Shopping List" full of new shinies that would make any feral tank smile. Here are the drops that bears would love to make use of in order of what boss they drop from...
drops off Beth'tilac <The Red Widow>
Cinderweb Leggings
Binds when picked up
Legs Leather
1592 Armor
+368 Agility
+611 Stamina
Red Socket
Yellow Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 212 (1.66% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 284 (1.58 @ L85).
Spidersilk Spindle
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: Spidersilk Spindle (1)
Trinket
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 383 (2.14 @ L85).
Equip: Melee attacks which reduce you below 35% health cause you to gain a protective shield which absorbs 17095 damage for 30 sec. Cannot occur more than once every 1 min.
Drops off Lord Rhyolith
Dreadfire Drape
Binds when picked up
Back
695 Armor
+212 Agility
+341 Stamina
Red Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 138 (1.15% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 95 (0.53 @ L85).
Hood of Rampant Disdain
Binds when picked up
Head Leather
1478 Armor
+348 Agility
+611 Stamina
Meta Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +30 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 295 (2.30% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 172 (5.73 @ L85).
There are no drops off Alysrazor
Drops off Shannox
Gloves of Dissolving Smoke
Binds when picked up
Hands Leather
1137 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 55 / 55
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 172 (0.96% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 208 (1.16 @ L85).
Drops off Baleroc
Breastplate of the Incendiary Soul
Binds when picked up
Chest Leather
1820 Armor
+368 Agility
+611 Stamina
Red Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 231 (1.80% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 267 (1.49 @ L85).
Shoulderpads of the Forgotten Gate
Binds when picked up
Shoulder Leather
1365 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 210 (1.75% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 153 (0.85% @ L85).
Drops off Majordomo Staghelm <Archdruid of the Flame>
Mantle of the Fiery Vanquisher
Binds when picked up
Classes: Rogue, Death Knight, Mage, Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
The above tier item will get you:
Obsidian Arborweave Spaulders
Binds when picked up
Shoulder Leather
1365 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 157 (0.88% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 216 (1.20 @ L85).
(2) Set: Your attacks with Mangle, Maul, and Shred deal 10% additional damage as Fire damage over 4 sec.
(4) Set: Your finishing moves have a 20% chance per combo point to extend the duration of Berserk by 2 + (20 * ComboPoints) sec and when your Barkskin ability expires you gain an additional 10% chance to dodge for 12 sec.
The Hungerer
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: The Hungerer (1)
Trinket
+383 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to grant you 1532 haste rating for 15 sec.
Fandral's Flamescythe
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1428 - 2143 Damage Speed 2.40
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 276 (1.54% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 265 (1.48 @ L85).
Sandals of Leaping Coals
Binds when picked up
Feet Leather
1251 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 75 / 75
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 133 (0.74% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 230 (1.28 @ L85).
Drops off Ragnaros
Choker of the Vanquished Lord
Binds when picked up
Neck
+240 Agility
+360 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 384
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 162 (1.27% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 156 (0.87 @ L85).
Matrix Restabilizer
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: Matrix Restabilizer (1)
Trinket
+406 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 384
Equip: Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to grant 1532 critical strike rating, haste rating, or mastery rating, whichever is currently highest.
As you can see, there is some really nice gear to be had in The Firelands. My only real recommendation would be to make sure that you are well geared for this raid before you step foot in there to kill bosses. These bosses are considerably harder then previous raid bosses (beyond the obvious reason that it's the next raid tier, they are really stepping up the game in this one). Don't rush in and end up being more of a problem then a help. This raid is not going anywhere anytime soon. You will find that your raiding experience in there will be far better if you are truly prepared. (flashes on Illidan: "You are Not prepared!" lol)
Keep up the good work and lets show those other tank classes how tanking is really done!
drops off Beth'tilac <The Red Widow>
Cinderweb Leggings
Binds when picked up
Legs Leather
1592 Armor
+368 Agility
+611 Stamina
Red Socket
Yellow Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 212 (1.66% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 284 (1.58 @ L85).
Spidersilk Spindle
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: Spidersilk Spindle (1)
Trinket
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 383 (2.14 @ L85).
Equip: Melee attacks which reduce you below 35% health cause you to gain a protective shield which absorbs 17095 damage for 30 sec. Cannot occur more than once every 1 min.
Drops off Lord Rhyolith
Dreadfire Drape
Binds when picked up
Back
695 Armor
+212 Agility
+341 Stamina
Red Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 138 (1.15% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 95 (0.53 @ L85).
Hood of Rampant Disdain
Binds when picked up
Head Leather
1478 Armor
+348 Agility
+611 Stamina
Meta Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +30 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 295 (2.30% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 172 (5.73 @ L85).
There are no drops off Alysrazor
Drops off Shannox
Gloves of Dissolving Smoke
Binds when picked up
Hands Leather
1137 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 55 / 55
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 172 (0.96% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 208 (1.16 @ L85).
Drops off Baleroc
Breastplate of the Incendiary Soul
Binds when picked up
Chest Leather
1820 Armor
+368 Agility
+611 Stamina
Red Socket
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +20 Agility
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 231 (1.80% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 267 (1.49 @ L85).
Shoulderpads of the Forgotten Gate
Binds when picked up
Shoulder Leather
1365 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 210 (1.75% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 153 (0.85% @ L85).
Drops off Majordomo Staghelm <Archdruid of the Flame>
Mantle of the Fiery Vanquisher
Binds when picked up
Classes: Rogue, Death Knight, Mage, Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
The above tier item will get you:
Obsidian Arborweave Spaulders
Binds when picked up
Shoulder Leather
1365 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 100 / 100
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 157 (0.88% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 216 (1.20 @ L85).
(2) Set: Your attacks with Mangle, Maul, and Shred deal 10% additional damage as Fire damage over 4 sec.
(4) Set: Your finishing moves have a 20% chance per combo point to extend the duration of Berserk by 2 + (20 * ComboPoints) sec and when your Barkskin ability expires you gain an additional 10% chance to dodge for 12 sec.
The Hungerer
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: The Hungerer (1)
Trinket
+383 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to grant you 1532 haste rating for 15 sec.
Fandral's Flamescythe
Binds when picked up
Two-Hand Staff
1428 - 2143 Damage Speed 2.40
(744.1 damage per second)
+408 Agility
+611 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 276 (1.54% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 265 (1.48 @ L85).
Sandals of Leaping Coals
Binds when picked up
Feet Leather
1251 Armor
+282 Agility
+454 Stamina
Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 75 / 75
Requires Level 85
Item Level 378
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 133 (0.74% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 230 (1.28 @ L85).
Drops off Ragnaros
Choker of the Vanquished Lord
Binds when picked up
Neck
+240 Agility
+360 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 384
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 162 (1.27% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 156 (0.87 @ L85).
Matrix Restabilizer
Binds when picked up
Unique-Equipped: Matrix Restabilizer (1)
Trinket
+406 Agility
Requires Level 85
Item Level 384
Equip: Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to grant 1532 critical strike rating, haste rating, or mastery rating, whichever is currently highest.
As you can see, there is some really nice gear to be had in The Firelands. My only real recommendation would be to make sure that you are well geared for this raid before you step foot in there to kill bosses. These bosses are considerably harder then previous raid bosses (beyond the obvious reason that it's the next raid tier, they are really stepping up the game in this one). Don't rush in and end up being more of a problem then a help. This raid is not going anywhere anytime soon. You will find that your raiding experience in there will be far better if you are truly prepared. (flashes on Illidan: "You are Not prepared!" lol)
Keep up the good work and lets show those other tank classes how tanking is really done!
Saturday, July 2, 2011
A few things that will make you a better tank. Part 3
Ok, when we last left off I was talking about playing the role of caster dps. Some people think I'm completely off my rocker for saying that to be a better tank, you need to do everything BUT tank. I have found that the best way to become a better tank is the ability to empathize with the other members of your group. If you understand what they are having to deal with, it will always help you to be able to make a pull better, get a boss down faster and make the run go smoother.
On that note, Melee is next!
No, some tanks out there have done this. Some have a melee spec and they go to town killing stuff. HOWEVER.....they usually do it in their tanking gear and have no fear of pull off the tank. This does nothing to make you a better player. All this does is give you a bigger epeen and make you the group pain in the @ss.
So, as stated in the last couple of blogs, start up a new toon, I recommend a warrior as this class is perfect for this. With a warrior, you can't step back and cast a heal on yourself to pull your butt out of the proverbial fire (or real fire if you were standing in it, lol). You will have to rely on paying attention and your healer to keep you alive. Level to 10 and then jump on BGs. This will give you the perfect place to learn to watch what is going on. If you can develop eyes in the back of your head, you will have learned a skill that will make you a good dps and a great tank, extreme situational awareness. This is a skill that you will find a great number of people are lacking. Even dps should know what is going on at all times with stuff in the room.
Once you hit 15, jump in to dungeons with both feet and learn new fun features such as "The tank keeps him moving when he doesn't need to....I CAN'T HIT HIM!!!!" or my favorite "Why does the tank keep turning him? I keep getting him by the mob since the tank faces him to me! AHHHH!!!" Watch closely at what your tank is doing and remember or even write down the things he/she does that drive you nuts. Don't yell at them in chat, it won't do any good. Just make a note of it and remember it.
So, now that you have played the roll of healer, caster and melee dps, you have a firm grasp on what the other members of your group go through on a daily basis. You know what they have to deal with trying to keep you alive and how the strive to keep themselves alive. Remember, you are the tank. It if your job to not just grab mobs and make fast pulls to show off your epeen. It is your job to keep the group alive. It is the healers job to keep you alive so that you can do your job. This means do not be afraid to CC something or to make a LoS pull or to kill that extra group of trash so that it does not get accidentally pulled. It's your job to keep them alive by setting up the run. You are the first one in there and it is your job to set up pulls so that no one gets killed (there are some exceptions such as people standing in fire. Cause you just can't fix stupid, lol.). You will find that once you try this technique of playing all the different rolls until about lvl20 or 30, you will have much better understanding of the real group dynamic and you will become a much better tank for it.
I hope this has helped out. I have done this and I can say that it gave me a lot of insight and makes my runs much smoother and with less repair bills. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to comment below and I will respond quickly. If you enjoy this blog,. please become a follower and spread the word about Neo's Challenging Roar!
On that note, Melee is next!
No, some tanks out there have done this. Some have a melee spec and they go to town killing stuff. HOWEVER.....they usually do it in their tanking gear and have no fear of pull off the tank. This does nothing to make you a better player. All this does is give you a bigger epeen and make you the group pain in the @ss.
So, as stated in the last couple of blogs, start up a new toon, I recommend a warrior as this class is perfect for this. With a warrior, you can't step back and cast a heal on yourself to pull your butt out of the proverbial fire (or real fire if you were standing in it, lol). You will have to rely on paying attention and your healer to keep you alive. Level to 10 and then jump on BGs. This will give you the perfect place to learn to watch what is going on. If you can develop eyes in the back of your head, you will have learned a skill that will make you a good dps and a great tank, extreme situational awareness. This is a skill that you will find a great number of people are lacking. Even dps should know what is going on at all times with stuff in the room.
Once you hit 15, jump in to dungeons with both feet and learn new fun features such as "The tank keeps him moving when he doesn't need to....I CAN'T HIT HIM!!!!" or my favorite "Why does the tank keep turning him? I keep getting him by the mob since the tank faces him to me! AHHHH!!!" Watch closely at what your tank is doing and remember or even write down the things he/she does that drive you nuts. Don't yell at them in chat, it won't do any good. Just make a note of it and remember it.
So, now that you have played the roll of healer, caster and melee dps, you have a firm grasp on what the other members of your group go through on a daily basis. You know what they have to deal with trying to keep you alive and how the strive to keep themselves alive. Remember, you are the tank. It if your job to not just grab mobs and make fast pulls to show off your epeen. It is your job to keep the group alive. It is the healers job to keep you alive so that you can do your job. This means do not be afraid to CC something or to make a LoS pull or to kill that extra group of trash so that it does not get accidentally pulled. It's your job to keep them alive by setting up the run. You are the first one in there and it is your job to set up pulls so that no one gets killed (there are some exceptions such as people standing in fire. Cause you just can't fix stupid, lol.). You will find that once you try this technique of playing all the different rolls until about lvl20 or 30, you will have much better understanding of the real group dynamic and you will become a much better tank for it.
I hope this has helped out. I have done this and I can say that it gave me a lot of insight and makes my runs much smoother and with less repair bills. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to comment below and I will respond quickly. If you enjoy this blog,. please become a follower and spread the word about Neo's Challenging Roar!
Monday, June 27, 2011
A few things that will make you a better tank. Part 2
So, in my last blog, I covered that one thing that will make you a better thank is to put yourself in the healers shoes for about 20 levels. Now, lets move on to dps. Every tank should play two different dps classes. One should be a melee and the other should be a mage since you get the ability to CC at a very low level.
Like before, level up to 10 and run BGs to get a better feel for shooting things that want to kill you more then spiders in Elwynn do. However, don't take off your heirloom. In fact, you should have the highest and strongest possible enchants on that heirloom gear. As soon as you hit 15, queue for dungeons. This is again where you will learn some good information and help you out as a tank. You should have gotten Polymorph at lvl14 so every chance you get in a dungeon, CC something near the group that might be or was accidentally pulled. Watch how the tank tends to ignore your CC and either hit it anyway or after the group is dead, walks past it like there is supposed to be a sheep walking around in Ragefire Chasm.
Now, you might be noticing that you are probably doing crazy dps with your heirloom gear on at this point and pulling mobs off the tank may be a bit on the easy side. You are now starting to understand that you might be under the tank on threat but it only takes 1 good crit to blow past him to make you run from the giant earth elemental screaming like a little girl as it pounds you in the face (ok, maybe that's just me that does that, lol).
Remember, dps are usually not totally fail or dumb. They don't CC stuff to annoy you but rather to help out. They don't mean to pull off you, sometimes a abnormally high crit happens. Trust me, normal dpsers don't want to pull mobs off you and tank them. They know that they can't take a hit like you can and don't want to try. You can always tell the good dps from the crazy epeen maniacs by whether they pull off you all the time or not. You are always gonna run in to the epeen maniacs at some point or another, it can't be avoided. That's what the pick feature is for.
Keep up the good work tanks, the world won't get anything done out there without you. Keep your eye out for the next part of this series on how to become a better tank. Remember, no one is perfect and we all have room for improvement.
Like before, level up to 10 and run BGs to get a better feel for shooting things that want to kill you more then spiders in Elwynn do. However, don't take off your heirloom. In fact, you should have the highest and strongest possible enchants on that heirloom gear. As soon as you hit 15, queue for dungeons. This is again where you will learn some good information and help you out as a tank. You should have gotten Polymorph at lvl14 so every chance you get in a dungeon, CC something near the group that might be or was accidentally pulled. Watch how the tank tends to ignore your CC and either hit it anyway or after the group is dead, walks past it like there is supposed to be a sheep walking around in Ragefire Chasm.
Now, you might be noticing that you are probably doing crazy dps with your heirloom gear on at this point and pulling mobs off the tank may be a bit on the easy side. You are now starting to understand that you might be under the tank on threat but it only takes 1 good crit to blow past him to make you run from the giant earth elemental screaming like a little girl as it pounds you in the face (ok, maybe that's just me that does that, lol).
Remember, dps are usually not totally fail or dumb. They don't CC stuff to annoy you but rather to help out. They don't mean to pull off you, sometimes a abnormally high crit happens. Trust me, normal dpsers don't want to pull mobs off you and tank them. They know that they can't take a hit like you can and don't want to try. You can always tell the good dps from the crazy epeen maniacs by whether they pull off you all the time or not. You are always gonna run in to the epeen maniacs at some point or another, it can't be avoided. That's what the pick feature is for.
Keep up the good work tanks, the world won't get anything done out there without you. Keep your eye out for the next part of this series on how to become a better tank. Remember, no one is perfect and we all have room for improvement.
Friday, June 24, 2011
A few things that will make you a better tank. Part 1
After a few runs I have had in the recent past, I have decided to cover a few things that will make a tank a much better tank. These are not your normal "get hit capped/more dodge/blah blah blah" stuff. This will make you a better tank in that you will find that your runs will be smoother and nicer, which makes for a much better experience. This will be a multi-part post that, by the end of the last post, you should have everything you need to make your life better in game.
The first this I recommend to EVERY tank out there is.......stop and roll a healer. Yes, you heard me correctly. Stop tanking and to roll a healer. don't respec or dual spec and get a healing spec. I mean start from square one and start healing. Put all your points in healing as soon as you get them and then, at lvl10, Take off ALL your heirloom gear, replace the removed items with normal green/white items you can find and queue for BGs. First, this will heal build healing skills. Good healers learn that you can't just stand there and heal, there are times you have to heal and run as much as you can. This is easily learned in doing battleground. A big orc warrior or little gnome rogue is not gonna let you just sit there and heal, you have to learn to heal and move to stay alive and keep people alive. Stay with the group, the only way to learn good healing skills is to stay with the group and heal as much as you can. Remember, don't get healer tunnel vision. This is where you are healing everyone so much, you forget to heal yourself. This happens far more then you would think.
Now that you have leveled to 15 in battlegrounds, KEEP your heirloom gear off and queue in for random dungeons. Now you learn some of the major tanking points in game. You will now see how often a tank runs in for the next pull before you are ready and have mana back. You will now see how often YOU are blamed for not keeping people alive, even though you were out of mana, siad you were out of mana but the tank went in anyway. Here is where you will learn that healers are not supposed to loot ANYTHING, you are just supposed to keep up and heal. You.....are a healbot. You will also find some groups that the tank will listen to chat. Will wait for you to get mana, will let you loot and will not go charging in if you have less them half mana. Learning this all first hand, you will see what the healing classes go through in almost every run they get in to.
If you want to become a better tank, both for your sanity and for the good of the group (since running a dungeon/raid is a GROUP activity), you will do this until about lvl20 or lvl30. It will only take you about 2 days to do this and you will learn just about everything you need to know. Remember, you will not truly learn anything if you run to the AH and twink yourself out. If you really want to do this, and I recommend you do, you will do it properly and do this in normal level appropriate gear.
My next blog will cover step 2 in becoming a better tank for you and your group. When all is said and done, you will be a far better tank then you are now. Trust me, I've done it.
The first this I recommend to EVERY tank out there is.......stop and roll a healer. Yes, you heard me correctly. Stop tanking and to roll a healer. don't respec or dual spec and get a healing spec. I mean start from square one and start healing. Put all your points in healing as soon as you get them and then, at lvl10, Take off ALL your heirloom gear, replace the removed items with normal green/white items you can find and queue for BGs. First, this will heal build healing skills. Good healers learn that you can't just stand there and heal, there are times you have to heal and run as much as you can. This is easily learned in doing battleground. A big orc warrior or little gnome rogue is not gonna let you just sit there and heal, you have to learn to heal and move to stay alive and keep people alive. Stay with the group, the only way to learn good healing skills is to stay with the group and heal as much as you can. Remember, don't get healer tunnel vision. This is where you are healing everyone so much, you forget to heal yourself. This happens far more then you would think.
Now that you have leveled to 15 in battlegrounds, KEEP your heirloom gear off and queue in for random dungeons. Now you learn some of the major tanking points in game. You will now see how often a tank runs in for the next pull before you are ready and have mana back. You will now see how often YOU are blamed for not keeping people alive, even though you were out of mana, siad you were out of mana but the tank went in anyway. Here is where you will learn that healers are not supposed to loot ANYTHING, you are just supposed to keep up and heal. You.....are a healbot. You will also find some groups that the tank will listen to chat. Will wait for you to get mana, will let you loot and will not go charging in if you have less them half mana. Learning this all first hand, you will see what the healing classes go through in almost every run they get in to.
If you want to become a better tank, both for your sanity and for the good of the group (since running a dungeon/raid is a GROUP activity), you will do this until about lvl20 or lvl30. It will only take you about 2 days to do this and you will learn just about everything you need to know. Remember, you will not truly learn anything if you run to the AH and twink yourself out. If you really want to do this, and I recommend you do, you will do it properly and do this in normal level appropriate gear.
My next blog will cover step 2 in becoming a better tank for you and your group. When all is said and done, you will be a far better tank then you are now. Trust me, I've done it.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Midsummer Fire Festival is upon us once again! So what's in it for bears?
I don't know about anyone else, but this is one of my favorite holidays in WoW, second only to Brewfest. Not only is there a ton of gold to easily be made by simply going around to all the zones and honoring your factions fires and desicrating the oposing factions fires, but there is Lord Ahune! Lord Ahune has been a giant loot pinata for several years now. Although we now get the extra fun stuff form a scatchel once a day, we can still grind out this boss fight for a shiny new cloak.
This is a good holiday for an easy upgrade for tanks. If you are a feral tank, you will want to keep you eye out for:
The Frost Lord's War Cloak
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+180 Agility
+270 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 137 (0.76% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 91 (0.71% @ L85).
Although it does not have the perfect stats, a nice back up to grab if you have not seen the War Cloak drop would be:
Icebound Cloak
Binds when picked up
Back
981 Armor
+180 Strength
+269 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your dodge rating by 143 (0.81% @ L85).
Although it does have strength on it, which will no longer be a desired stat for bears after 4.2 hit, it does still have nice stam and dodge stats on it. So if you see this drop, grab it if you can and just keep grinding for the War Cloak. This way, if it doesn't drop, atleast you still got a rather nice tank cloak upgrade.
Lord Ahune also drops some items that would make a nice offspec addition. The Shroud of Winter's Chill:
Shroud of Winter's Chill
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+256 Stamina
+180 Intellect
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 120 (0.67% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 120 (0.94% @ L85).
would make a great Moonkin cloak and the Cloak of the Frigid Winds would make an excellent resto cloak.
Cloak of the Frigid Winds
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+256 Stamina
+180 Intellect
+120 Spirit
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 120 (0.94% @ L85).
The oddest weapon though is the Frostscythe of Lord Ahune. Although it does give spell power, it also comes with a ton of haste, critical strike and a whopping 700 stamina! That's almost double what good tank staves have. This begins to make me think that if your stats are high enough, you could probably play around with this as a fun tank weapon, although I'd probably avoid using it in your next raid, lol.
Frostscythe of Lord Ahune
Binds when picked up
Unique
Two-Hand Staff
559 - 840 Damage Speed 3.20
(218.6 damage per second)
+700 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 207 (1.15% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 207 (1.62% @ L85).
Equip: Increases spell power by 1849.
Use: Let the Frostscythe's chill flow through you. (1 Min Cooldown)
So take your time, have some fun and enjoy the next two weeks of Midsummer Fire Festival. You can make easy gold and get some nice and fun upgrade here. Maybe ever get taht elusive pet Frigid Frostling.
This is a good holiday for an easy upgrade for tanks. If you are a feral tank, you will want to keep you eye out for:
The Frost Lord's War Cloak
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+180 Agility
+270 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 137 (0.76% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 91 (0.71% @ L85).
Although it does not have the perfect stats, a nice back up to grab if you have not seen the War Cloak drop would be:
Icebound Cloak
Binds when picked up
Back
981 Armor
+180 Strength
+269 Stamina
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your dodge rating by 143 (0.81% @ L85).
Although it does have strength on it, which will no longer be a desired stat for bears after 4.2 hit, it does still have nice stam and dodge stats on it. So if you see this drop, grab it if you can and just keep grinding for the War Cloak. This way, if it doesn't drop, atleast you still got a rather nice tank cloak upgrade.
Lord Ahune also drops some items that would make a nice offspec addition. The Shroud of Winter's Chill:
Shroud of Winter's Chill
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+256 Stamina
+180 Intellect
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 120 (0.67% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 120 (0.94% @ L85).
would make a great Moonkin cloak and the Cloak of the Frigid Winds would make an excellent resto cloak.
Cloak of the Frigid Winds
Binds when picked up
Back
604 Armor
+256 Stamina
+180 Intellect
+120 Spirit
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 120 (0.94% @ L85).
The oddest weapon though is the Frostscythe of Lord Ahune. Although it does give spell power, it also comes with a ton of haste, critical strike and a whopping 700 stamina! That's almost double what good tank staves have. This begins to make me think that if your stats are high enough, you could probably play around with this as a fun tank weapon, although I'd probably avoid using it in your next raid, lol.
Frostscythe of Lord Ahune
Binds when picked up
Unique
Two-Hand Staff
559 - 840 Damage Speed 3.20
(218.6 damage per second)
+700 Stamina
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 85
Item Level 353
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 207 (1.15% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 207 (1.62% @ L85).
Equip: Increases spell power by 1849.
Use: Let the Frostscythe's chill flow through you. (1 Min Cooldown)
So take your time, have some fun and enjoy the next two weeks of Midsummer Fire Festival. You can make easy gold and get some nice and fun upgrade here. Maybe ever get taht elusive pet Frigid Frostling.
Friday, June 17, 2011
"Smart Authenticator", smart move or the key to pissing lots of people off?
So, Blizzard has decided to take it security one step farther and start to keep track of where you log in to your account. By doing this, they have set it up to where if you log in from a computer you usually log in from, it will no longer ask you for an authenticator code. I've been checking the forums and wowinsider.com post about this and I must say, it seems that a large chunk of the forums population is completely against this.
This is what I see on the forums. Some people are happy with this because it was a hassle and took too much time to log in when you had to enter an authenticator code. If you got DC'd in the middle of a fight, it would seem like "forever" to log back in. They feel that they are still secure and that this is a welcome change.
On the flip side, I see people complaining that they don't completely feel safe anymore. They claim the Blizzards systems have had problems before and if a "glitch" happens when someone is trying to hack their account, and it does not ask for a code, Blizzard will simply say "Sorry, sucks to be you.". However, those that are not happy at all with this change all offer a simple fix to make everyone happy...an "opt out" option. Also, most comment about how they don't mind the extra 5 seconds it takes to enter in a code since it is only 5 seconds and they feel more secure.
Here is what I think about this entire situation. I feel that Blizzard, having been dealing with the public for a good number of years now, seemed to have been totally blind to what people would think. It makes me think if they even gave any thought beyond the "This would be a great improvement to security, lets do it" idea. Anyone living on this planet we call Earth knows one simple fact about people in general. People feel far more secure if they have or feel they have control over a situation. By having people enter in an authenticator code at login, they feel that they are secure, that unless someone came in to their home and stole it, they don't have to worry about account security. By taking this away from people you take away that feeling of security, even if they are just as or even more secure then before. I'm surprised that Blizzard did not put thought in to this aspect. They made authenticators optional, I feel that they should have added an "opt-out" option to this feature too. I also think Blizzard completely and totally dropped the ball here in another way. We log in one day, everything is fine. We log in the next day, tons of people are not asked for their code. There was not even a "Breaking News" post on the log in screen for a god amount of time. This completely freaked out some people that were logging on. There was no warning or mention that was made clear to anyone that I'm aware of. If Blizzard had posted up info about this coming maybe a couple of days in advance, people would still not be happy, but it would not have caused people to freak out either when they didn't know what was going on for the longest time.
Come on Blizzard, you are business and deal with lots people everyday. How did you not see this coming, and if you did, you did a terrible job preparing for it. Humanity has this thing about feeling secure. All you would have had to do to keep EVERYONE happy....was to create an "opt-out" option. I hope we see it in the near future since I for one and not happy with this either. I don't mind the 5 seconds, even if I get DC'd in the middle of a raid, to entire the code in. I'm not happy with is though because you changed your security features while giving me the same options. Like it or ditch your authenticator, those are my choices and I'm not happy with it. If you are going to make changes, you need to give people options.
This is what I have found and how I feel. Feel free to post here about how you feel or comment on this post. I will reply to any and all comments here quickly
This is what I see on the forums. Some people are happy with this because it was a hassle and took too much time to log in when you had to enter an authenticator code. If you got DC'd in the middle of a fight, it would seem like "forever" to log back in. They feel that they are still secure and that this is a welcome change.
On the flip side, I see people complaining that they don't completely feel safe anymore. They claim the Blizzards systems have had problems before and if a "glitch" happens when someone is trying to hack their account, and it does not ask for a code, Blizzard will simply say "Sorry, sucks to be you.". However, those that are not happy at all with this change all offer a simple fix to make everyone happy...an "opt out" option. Also, most comment about how they don't mind the extra 5 seconds it takes to enter in a code since it is only 5 seconds and they feel more secure.
Here is what I think about this entire situation. I feel that Blizzard, having been dealing with the public for a good number of years now, seemed to have been totally blind to what people would think. It makes me think if they even gave any thought beyond the "This would be a great improvement to security, lets do it" idea. Anyone living on this planet we call Earth knows one simple fact about people in general. People feel far more secure if they have or feel they have control over a situation. By having people enter in an authenticator code at login, they feel that they are secure, that unless someone came in to their home and stole it, they don't have to worry about account security. By taking this away from people you take away that feeling of security, even if they are just as or even more secure then before. I'm surprised that Blizzard did not put thought in to this aspect. They made authenticators optional, I feel that they should have added an "opt-out" option to this feature too. I also think Blizzard completely and totally dropped the ball here in another way. We log in one day, everything is fine. We log in the next day, tons of people are not asked for their code. There was not even a "Breaking News" post on the log in screen for a god amount of time. This completely freaked out some people that were logging on. There was no warning or mention that was made clear to anyone that I'm aware of. If Blizzard had posted up info about this coming maybe a couple of days in advance, people would still not be happy, but it would not have caused people to freak out either when they didn't know what was going on for the longest time.
Come on Blizzard, you are business and deal with lots people everyday. How did you not see this coming, and if you did, you did a terrible job preparing for it. Humanity has this thing about feeling secure. All you would have had to do to keep EVERYONE happy....was to create an "opt-out" option. I hope we see it in the near future since I for one and not happy with this either. I don't mind the 5 seconds, even if I get DC'd in the middle of a raid, to entire the code in. I'm not happy with is though because you changed your security features while giving me the same options. Like it or ditch your authenticator, those are my choices and I'm not happy with it. If you are going to make changes, you need to give people options.
This is what I have found and how I feel. Feel free to post here about how you feel or comment on this post. I will reply to any and all comments here quickly
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Who will be Cataclysm's big bad guy in the end?
SARGERAS.......
Now, I know what some people are saying. Sargeras is dead. Medivh's mother killed him in the past and buried his body in the Maelstrom. And that his essence went in to her an then in to Medivh who was later killed by Khadgar. This is all completely true according to lore and what has been seen in game. However, when Khadgar killed Medivh, it freed his soul from the essence of Sargeras. This did not destroy the essence, it only detached it from Medivhs soul, freeing him. Secondly, His mother never killed Sargeras, she merely destroyed his avatar that was on Azeroth. He himself never came through and is still in the twisting nether. With his essence still in Azeroth, he could have been spending all this time gaining strength again and quietly building up an army on Azeroth to do his bidding
This name comes to mind time and time again as I take in all the lore and quests around me in the this expansion. Allow me to explain. There are several events that have happened so far in this expansion that point to Sargeras.
First, the Twilight Cultists refer to "The Master" when they speak if the person in charge, even Deathwing himself has referred to "The Master". People have speculated that the "head bad guy" in this expansion could be the Old Gods. I'm not so sure about that. First off there is the obvious problem in phrasing. Simply put, Old Gods can not me "THE" Master. But, if you were to take it down to just one of the Old Gods, then that would put them back in the running. But there is more information that pulls it back away form the old gods.
Next, what is the one race that stopped Sageras from coming through to Azeroth and were a main force in repeatedly stopping the Burning Legion over and over again? The Night Elves. What is one of the only places to actually take a massive hit in Cataclysm? The Park District in Stormwind. Now, yes, he has destroyed mountains in the badlands and re trashed the dame in Loch Modan, but The Park District is different. Deathwing swoops down, obliterates the Park District, roars around Stormwind for a minute or two and then leaves. Does not kill or trash anything else really. Sure he messes up the front gate area a bit, but nothing like sending an entire district to the sea. This is even spoken of by some of the guards in Stormwind. If Sargeras was "The Master", then Deathwing would be acting under instructions from Sargeras and would even be working to make his master happy. So taking out an entire area of Night Elves would be a good start.
Now, it is confirmed that we will be getting a new Caverns of Time instance. This in itself is not too big a deal until you find out that it is taking us back to the War of the Ancients. This is where the Burning Legion and Sargeras first start to come to Azeroth for its power and to take over and bring chaos to the world. Blizzard is literally bringing us back to the events that changed the world as we know it and the events that would lead to the Burning Crusade expansion. Seems a bit odd to go there if the head bad guy here is one or all of the remaining Old Gods.
Now, I know what some people are saying. Sargeras is dead. Medivh's mother killed him in the past and buried his body in the Maelstrom. And that his essence went in to her an then in to Medivh who was later killed by Khadgar. This is all completely true according to lore and what has been seen in game. However, when Khadgar killed Medivh, it freed his soul from the essence of Sargeras. This did not destroy the essence, it only detached it from Medivhs soul, freeing him. Secondly, His mother never killed Sargeras, she merely destroyed his avatar that was on Azeroth. He himself never came through and is still in the twisting nether. With his essence still in Azeroth, he could have been spending all this time gaining strength again and quietly building up an army on Azeroth to do his bidding
One other thing that I noticed that seems odd, Deathwing went almost straight for Uldum and recruited lackeys to help him get the power of the Origination Machine that is there in Uldum, left by the Titans. Now, how could he have know everything about that machine, that is was there and how it worked and what he needed his lackeys to go after? Well, if your boss was a crazy, insane demon version of a Titan that was once on the good guys team and helped to create Azeroth, you would know about the Origination machine and how to use it. And since, assuming he has no physical form at this point, Sargeras would have to recruit a lackey of his own to get get stuff done for him, enter Deathwing, who is already nuts and would be easily susceptible to the power that Sargeras could offer him.
Kinda starts you thinking, doesn't it? Well, keep in mind that this is all just ideas that I have though about for awhile now and could be completely wrong. But you never know, there are a lot of things going on that do seem to point to Sargeras. We will just have to wait and see.
If you enjoy these blogs, please become a follower and spread the word about Neo's Challenging Roar. Feel free to comment or ask any questions about this post int he comment section, I will respond to any questions or comments quickly.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Can you live in BC again?
I've been seeing people talk lately about "retro-toons" and was curious as to what this was exactly. It seems that there are people that are creating new characters, leveling them up to lvl70 and then.....*gasp*, capping their experience. At first I thought this was a bit of a crazy idea. However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I had so much fun back in BC that it might be worth a shot. So I leveled up a mage that I already had sitting as lvl62 and capped off my XP at 70. It was at that point that I had a huge rush of flashbacks from when I hit lvl70 on my druid back in Burning Crusade.
My first stop, Isle of Quel'Danas! Time to start knocking out my Isle dailys again. The more I started doing some rep grinding in dungeons and with turn ins, not to mention beginning to gather some better gear through quartermasters and dungeons, I began to have more fun than I thought I would. I figured it would be fun for a few days and probably lose it's interest, at which point I'd simply turn back on my XP and move on. But it's been well over a week and I haven't lost any interest yet. Maybe it's the fact that I know I can always turn on my XP and move on if I get bored. Maybe it the fact that Blizzard has, in the past, made changes to the over all stats in the game and even with the actual BC gear, I'm doing more damage now then I did then. Who knows, all I know is that it's become so much fun, I have 5 other guild member that have decided to do the same thing. Next thing we know, we'll have enough people at lvl70 to run Karazhan with all 70s, lol.
I must admit, it's has been really fun. Running some Cataclysm raids on my level 85 toons and then switching over and running dungeons and other stuff on my level 70 has been a blast so far. I hope that it doesn't get old or boring any time soon. One thing we, the people in my guild that are going to have toons stay at lvl70, have decided is no twinking. By this, we mean that you have to get gear from dungeons, heroics, raids, quests or quartermasters. Running battlegrounds to power through and grab all the super-high level PvP gear you can takes away form the fun of it and is somewhat frowned on. 1 or 2 pieces of PvP are ok, but full BG epics is a bit much.
If you have a level70 toon and are interested in having some fun on the Anvilmar server (Alliance side), cap that XP off and give me a pst. Just whisper Taeo (my lvl70) or Neotaeo, if I'm not on then just whisper anyone in <DunderMifflin> and if they can't invite you, they will let someone know that can that you want an invite. Come and have some fun, that is what retro-toons are all about!
My first stop, Isle of Quel'Danas! Time to start knocking out my Isle dailys again. The more I started doing some rep grinding in dungeons and with turn ins, not to mention beginning to gather some better gear through quartermasters and dungeons, I began to have more fun than I thought I would. I figured it would be fun for a few days and probably lose it's interest, at which point I'd simply turn back on my XP and move on. But it's been well over a week and I haven't lost any interest yet. Maybe it's the fact that I know I can always turn on my XP and move on if I get bored. Maybe it the fact that Blizzard has, in the past, made changes to the over all stats in the game and even with the actual BC gear, I'm doing more damage now then I did then. Who knows, all I know is that it's become so much fun, I have 5 other guild member that have decided to do the same thing. Next thing we know, we'll have enough people at lvl70 to run Karazhan with all 70s, lol.
I must admit, it's has been really fun. Running some Cataclysm raids on my level 85 toons and then switching over and running dungeons and other stuff on my level 70 has been a blast so far. I hope that it doesn't get old or boring any time soon. One thing we, the people in my guild that are going to have toons stay at lvl70, have decided is no twinking. By this, we mean that you have to get gear from dungeons, heroics, raids, quests or quartermasters. Running battlegrounds to power through and grab all the super-high level PvP gear you can takes away form the fun of it and is somewhat frowned on. 1 or 2 pieces of PvP are ok, but full BG epics is a bit much.
If you have a level70 toon and are interested in having some fun on the Anvilmar server (Alliance side), cap that XP off and give me a pst. Just whisper Taeo (my lvl70) or Neotaeo, if I'm not on then just whisper anyone in <DunderMifflin> and if they can't invite you, they will let someone know that can that you want an invite. Come and have some fun, that is what retro-toons are all about!
Friday, June 10, 2011
Healing is part of your job too.
Now I know that people think, "You're the healer. it's your job to heal, not mine!", or "I'm here to dps, not heal.". Well, for a feral tank, this is just not true. Healing yourself is part of your job and makes the healing easier for the healer and will keep you alive longer. Now, this is not something you have to go out of your way to do. Part of it comes totally natural from talent points alone:
Leader of the Pack
While in Cat Form or Bear Form, the Leader of the Pack increases critical strike chance of all party and raid members within 100 yards by 5%. In addition, your melee critical strikes in Cat Form and Bear Form cause you to heal for 4% of your total health and gain 8% of your maximum mana. This effect cannot occur more than once every 6 sec.
This alone is a big heal in the long run. Any healing you do to yourself here is mana not being used by the healer and mana that can be utilized in a "crunch time" situation. I share this here as some people take a tank build that they see from a blog (I've posted mine here in an earlier post) or off the wow armory or from other places, which is fine. Problem, some people don't take the time to read the talents and why they should be chosen. This is one that should be.
Another thing you can do it use a glyph for your Frenzied Regeneration:
Glyph of Frenzied Regeneration
Major Glyph
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 52
Item Level 52
Use: Permanently teaches you this glyph.
While Frenzied Regeneration is active, healing effects on you are 30% more powerful but causes your Frenzied Regeneration to no longer convert rage into health.
Now this is a big step for some tanks as this makes you put full trust and faith in your healer and takes some of your self healing abilities away from your. To me, this is a great glyph to have since it infact boosts the healing done to you by the healer AND by your Leader of the Pack talents. At the point you hit Frenzied Regeneration, you will want to do something very important. Keep your eye out for a Lightwell or any kind of AoE healing effect on the ground. If you see these, get in them. Some would argue that a Lightwell is really only for the dps so that the healer can focus more on the tank and not so much on dps. This could not be farther from the truth. Any and all healing you can do to yourself will help save the healer mana for use when it is truly needed to keep your bear butt up, lol.
Remember, tanking is part of the team effort. If you want to succeed, you need to think like part of the team and not as just the tank. Any and all thing you can do to help the healer must be high priority. The healer and dps will thank you for this. If the healer goes out of mana (oom) or dies, you will not be standing for very long after.
Keep up the good work tanks. Remember we all want to get through a run alive, working together will make that happen.
Leader of the Pack
While in Cat Form or Bear Form, the Leader of the Pack increases critical strike chance of all party and raid members within 100 yards by 5%. In addition, your melee critical strikes in Cat Form and Bear Form cause you to heal for 4% of your total health and gain 8% of your maximum mana. This effect cannot occur more than once every 6 sec.
This alone is a big heal in the long run. Any healing you do to yourself here is mana not being used by the healer and mana that can be utilized in a "crunch time" situation. I share this here as some people take a tank build that they see from a blog (I've posted mine here in an earlier post) or off the wow armory or from other places, which is fine. Problem, some people don't take the time to read the talents and why they should be chosen. This is one that should be.
Another thing you can do it use a glyph for your Frenzied Regeneration:
Glyph of Frenzied Regeneration
Major Glyph
Classes: Druid
Requires Level 52
Item Level 52
Use: Permanently teaches you this glyph.
While Frenzied Regeneration is active, healing effects on you are 30% more powerful but causes your Frenzied Regeneration to no longer convert rage into health.
Now this is a big step for some tanks as this makes you put full trust and faith in your healer and takes some of your self healing abilities away from your. To me, this is a great glyph to have since it infact boosts the healing done to you by the healer AND by your Leader of the Pack talents. At the point you hit Frenzied Regeneration, you will want to do something very important. Keep your eye out for a Lightwell or any kind of AoE healing effect on the ground. If you see these, get in them. Some would argue that a Lightwell is really only for the dps so that the healer can focus more on the tank and not so much on dps. This could not be farther from the truth. Any and all healing you can do to yourself will help save the healer mana for use when it is truly needed to keep your bear butt up, lol.
Remember, tanking is part of the team effort. If you want to succeed, you need to think like part of the team and not as just the tank. Any and all thing you can do to help the healer must be high priority. The healer and dps will thank you for this. If the healer goes out of mana (oom) or dies, you will not be standing for very long after.
Keep up the good work tanks. Remember we all want to get through a run alive, working together will make that happen.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
A little about the blogger...
After handing out all this information about tanking and everything else I have covered in my blog, I though I should take a moment to give you a look in to where this wealth of knowledge (pffft) comes from. A little background on me, the blogger so you can maybe understand a little bit more about why I have the opinions I do and why I have taken it so seriously to gather up all the information I have obtained over the years and feel the need to share it with everyone out there that is looking for some help or maybe just a confirmation of what they were thinking.
I stated playing World of Warcraft back in early/mid 2006. My first toon was......a mage. I know, but I soon learned the ways of the tank side, lol. After a lot of thinking about it, I grabbed myself a free trial of WoW. I always loved the Warcraft games and thought, why not. Man, I was not prepared for what I saw. I started out as a human not having a clue as to what was going on. didn't know what quests were, didn't know anything. I wondered around in awe of the landscape of the game. To me, the Elywnn Forest was amazing looking. I Stumbled on Stormwind and didn't have a clue a I got lost (didn't know about hitting "M" for a map yet, lol). I found what I thought was a underground train that would take me around the city....WRONG! I get off the tram and wonder around some more. I finally find what looks like an entrance and.....I find myself in a high mountain peak, surrounded by snow. I was shocked and in awe....and had to have this game! I told my wife that she had to try this game out. After all, she is the one that got me in to the warcraft games in the first place. After she roamed around a bit, it was settled, we got a WoW account.
After about 6 months, I got a second account. Since I knew nothing about character transfers, I started a new toon..my druid Neotaeo. My original reason for this was I liked the description of being able to cast spells AND heal myself. Little did I know that in my leveling, I would learn how to change forms. This was a big thing for me, I loved it. The survivability of the bear form really kept my attention. Of course, I still had no idea what a tank was. I wouldn't learn what a tank was until I got to about level 50ish. By this time, My wife and I had seen the demon attacks on cities and discovered the upcoming Burning Crusade expansion. So with the coming of BC, I became a full on tank...kind of. It was a steep learning curve and bears were looked down on even harder then ever in times after.
By the time I hit lvl70, I was the GM of my guild, tanking anything I could get in to and building up a guild group for dungeons. I began to tank everything in sight, it didn't matter what it was or how hard it was, I tanked it ( or at least tried to). I began to read up about feral tanking. Back then, we still needed defense, although, we didn't not need as much as other classes. This is when I found myself becoming all too familiar with 2 major things in BC. 1, everyone would rather take a pally in a group then a bear, and if there was no pally, they just would not go some times. 2, bears were stacking stamina (NOOOOOO!!!!!!). It was at that point that I decided 2 things. I was going to make a name for myself as one of the very few bear tanks on the server people would have no trouble running with. And 2, I was going to do bear tanking against what most people were doing. Almost everyone was stam-stacking and that did not make sense to me. If you can get your dodge rating up high, you will take less damage and therefore need less heals. By the end of BC, I was getting requests from some of the bigger raiding guilds on my server to tank raids like SSC, and Gruuls ( I made a lot of friends tanking heroic dungeons with people) and I was proving that stam-stacking was NOT the way to go, even if people didn't listen.
With the coming of Wrath of the Lich King, bears had changed. We got rid of defense and got some nice AoE attacks. This was like music to my ears, if we don't have to have defense, we can add more agility to our gear where we can. Wrath however, caused problems that we would not understand until Cataclysm would hit. Tanks, bears included became lazy and impatient. We would run in to a group, round them up and begin to hold everything, and it was not hard for us. Even I fell in to the trap that was Wrath. When Cataclysm hit us, we were in a world of hurt. Tanks that were so use to running in and grabbing everything were dying very quick because Blizzard had brought back the need for crowd control (CC). I know I found myself in a fix. They had done major changes to bear that left us all but broken, but they also changed the rules of the game back to BC style mob pulls. I'll be honest, I hung up my bear suit for awhile after trying very hard to relearn how to bear tank. But this gave me a good opportunity as I rolled a Death Knight for the sole reason of tanking. I could learn form scratch how to tank in Cataclysm. Although I was now a DK tank, I still kept up on druid tanking and gave Blizzard my two cents worth of information and feeling on how they could change bears and make them more playable again. After all, it was at that point that bear tanks all but disappeared ingame. We all felt the same way, and I'm glad that Blizzard listened. With the big changes they did to bear tanks again, they brought us back out and in the main stream of tanking again.
So, I have seen and been through so many different incarnations of feral tanking and have done so much person trial and error for what works with bears that I feel that I need to share it with those that are either just starting out in feral tanking or might be thinking about it. I share this with those that might be looking for some piece of information that confirms what they think. I even happily share my info with those that would argue against my points as I know that I don't know everything and there might be a different way of doing things that are better or easier at the time. For over 4 years now I have been the GM and main tank of <DunderMifflin> and I intend on continuing tanking until they shutdown the servers.
I stated playing World of Warcraft back in early/mid 2006. My first toon was......a mage. I know, but I soon learned the ways of the tank side, lol. After a lot of thinking about it, I grabbed myself a free trial of WoW. I always loved the Warcraft games and thought, why not. Man, I was not prepared for what I saw. I started out as a human not having a clue as to what was going on. didn't know what quests were, didn't know anything. I wondered around in awe of the landscape of the game. To me, the Elywnn Forest was amazing looking. I Stumbled on Stormwind and didn't have a clue a I got lost (didn't know about hitting "M" for a map yet, lol). I found what I thought was a underground train that would take me around the city....WRONG! I get off the tram and wonder around some more. I finally find what looks like an entrance and.....I find myself in a high mountain peak, surrounded by snow. I was shocked and in awe....and had to have this game! I told my wife that she had to try this game out. After all, she is the one that got me in to the warcraft games in the first place. After she roamed around a bit, it was settled, we got a WoW account.
After about 6 months, I got a second account. Since I knew nothing about character transfers, I started a new toon..my druid Neotaeo. My original reason for this was I liked the description of being able to cast spells AND heal myself. Little did I know that in my leveling, I would learn how to change forms. This was a big thing for me, I loved it. The survivability of the bear form really kept my attention. Of course, I still had no idea what a tank was. I wouldn't learn what a tank was until I got to about level 50ish. By this time, My wife and I had seen the demon attacks on cities and discovered the upcoming Burning Crusade expansion. So with the coming of BC, I became a full on tank...kind of. It was a steep learning curve and bears were looked down on even harder then ever in times after.
By the time I hit lvl70, I was the GM of my guild, tanking anything I could get in to and building up a guild group for dungeons. I began to tank everything in sight, it didn't matter what it was or how hard it was, I tanked it ( or at least tried to). I began to read up about feral tanking. Back then, we still needed defense, although, we didn't not need as much as other classes. This is when I found myself becoming all too familiar with 2 major things in BC. 1, everyone would rather take a pally in a group then a bear, and if there was no pally, they just would not go some times. 2, bears were stacking stamina (NOOOOOO!!!!!!). It was at that point that I decided 2 things. I was going to make a name for myself as one of the very few bear tanks on the server people would have no trouble running with. And 2, I was going to do bear tanking against what most people were doing. Almost everyone was stam-stacking and that did not make sense to me. If you can get your dodge rating up high, you will take less damage and therefore need less heals. By the end of BC, I was getting requests from some of the bigger raiding guilds on my server to tank raids like SSC, and Gruuls ( I made a lot of friends tanking heroic dungeons with people) and I was proving that stam-stacking was NOT the way to go, even if people didn't listen.
With the coming of Wrath of the Lich King, bears had changed. We got rid of defense and got some nice AoE attacks. This was like music to my ears, if we don't have to have defense, we can add more agility to our gear where we can. Wrath however, caused problems that we would not understand until Cataclysm would hit. Tanks, bears included became lazy and impatient. We would run in to a group, round them up and begin to hold everything, and it was not hard for us. Even I fell in to the trap that was Wrath. When Cataclysm hit us, we were in a world of hurt. Tanks that were so use to running in and grabbing everything were dying very quick because Blizzard had brought back the need for crowd control (CC). I know I found myself in a fix. They had done major changes to bear that left us all but broken, but they also changed the rules of the game back to BC style mob pulls. I'll be honest, I hung up my bear suit for awhile after trying very hard to relearn how to bear tank. But this gave me a good opportunity as I rolled a Death Knight for the sole reason of tanking. I could learn form scratch how to tank in Cataclysm. Although I was now a DK tank, I still kept up on druid tanking and gave Blizzard my two cents worth of information and feeling on how they could change bears and make them more playable again. After all, it was at that point that bear tanks all but disappeared ingame. We all felt the same way, and I'm glad that Blizzard listened. With the big changes they did to bear tanks again, they brought us back out and in the main stream of tanking again.
So, I have seen and been through so many different incarnations of feral tanking and have done so much person trial and error for what works with bears that I feel that I need to share it with those that are either just starting out in feral tanking or might be thinking about it. I share this with those that might be looking for some piece of information that confirms what they think. I even happily share my info with those that would argue against my points as I know that I don't know everything and there might be a different way of doing things that are better or easier at the time. For over 4 years now I have been the GM and main tank of <DunderMifflin> and I intend on continuing tanking until they shutdown the servers.
Sunday, June 5, 2011
More changes for feral druids in 4.2.
In an earlier post, I went over a few of the changes we can expect to see in feral druids when 4.2 goes live. With the PTR still up and running, the changes keep coming. Here are the changes that we can expect to see at this point in time if 4.2 were to hit today.
Blizzard feels that bear damage abilities were scaling too fast with higher gear levels compared to other tanks, so they have made the following changes to try to balance out druids with other tanking classes (booo). Keep in mind that these numbers are all for lvl85 feral druids.
Blizzard feels that bear damage abilities were scaling too fast with higher gear levels compared to other tanks, so they have made the following changes to try to balance out druids with other tanking classes (booo). Keep in mind that these numbers are all for lvl85 feral druids.
- Faerie Fire (Feral) base damage has been raised to 2950, up from 679. Attack power scaling has been decreased to 10.8%, down from 15%.
- Maul base damage has been raised to 35, up from 8. Attack power scaling has been decreased to 19%, down from 26.4%.
- Pulverize weapon damage percent has been decreased to 60%, down from 80%. Damage per Lacerate application has been increased to 1623, up from 361.
- Mangle (Bear) weapon damage percent has been decreased to 190%, down from 260%. Bonus damage has been increased to 3306, down from 754.
- Swipe base damage has been increased to 929, up from 215. Attack power scaling has been decreased to 12.3%, down from 17.1%.
- Thrash initial base damage has been increased to 1042, up from 339. Initial damage attack power scaling has been decreased to 9.82%, down from 19.2%. Periodic base damage has been increased to 581, up from 189. Periodic damage attack power scaling has been decreased to 1.67%, down from 3.26%. In addition, a bug was corrected where armor decreased the periodic damage done by this ability.
- Lacerate initial base damage has been increased to 3608, up from 2089. Initial damage attack power scaling has been decreased to 5.52%, down from 7.66%. Periodic base damage has been increased to 69, up from 16. Periodic damage attack power scaling has been decreased to 0.369%, down from 0.512%.
- Natural Reaction damage reduction has been increased to 9/18%, up from 6/12%.
So lets take a look at the information they have given us. Overall, they are giving us rather large increases in initial damage done. In the area were we normally see our attacks scale up quickly, we will be seeing it slow down a good deal. Now I know that some people are already freaking out about this. "They are nerfing us again! Why does Blizzard hate feral?". This could not be farther from the truth. First off, they are probably tired of hearing the other tank classes complain that we are becoming insane as a tanking class. Feral has always been looked down on and since the drop of 4.1, we have been coming back with a vengeance. Second, if you look at the stats they are showing us, you will most likely not really notice any significant changes while tanking, in either lower level content or in current raiding content.
The only real change we might notice is from Natural Reaction:
- Reduces damage taken while in Bear Form by 18% (was 12%), increases your dodge while in Bear Form by 6%, and you generate 3 Rage every time you dodge while in Bear Form.
Any time we see an increase in damage reduction in the feral class, this is a big thing. We already have a large about of damage we do not take through our avoidance (agility/dodge rating), so any amount of damage after that will now be reduced by 18% at the top end. Lets put this in hard terms. If you get hit for 47,000, after Natural Reaction kicks in, you will have only taken 38,540 worth of damage. That's a pretty big number. Before the change, you would have taken 41,360 worth of damage. That to me is a significant change for the good.
All in all, I'm interested to see how these changes play out in the long run. Regardless of how the changes affect feral tanking, I know that I for one will not give up and still go out there and show those other tanking classes how it's done!
Remember, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to comment below. I will respond to any questions quickly. If you like this blog, become a follower and spread the word about Neo's Challenging Roar!
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Battle of the tank: which class is the best tank.
Ok, so you all have seen trade chat or even had conversations with guildies or friends on this subject. Everyone in game knows that this has been a heated topic for years and will continue to be as long as the WoW servers are up. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you have probably just started playing or been living under a rock. What is the question? Here it is, which tanking class is the best. We all hear the tank of paladins being on top. At the moment, some say it is Death Knights that are the best tanks. Here, I will answer this long asked question once and for all.
The best tanking class is: Feral Druids.
Ok, just kidding. Actually, there is no one answer to this question. No matter what people may say, there is absolutely no one tank designed to do it all and do it perfectly. Blizzard just did not deign the tanking classes that way, and for good reason.
So, let me explain why this is. First off, if one tanking class was perfect at doing it all, there would be absolutely no reason to have any other class as a tank. If DKs were perfect, pallys, druid and warriors would all be obsolete. Second, by having tanks that are better in one are and worse in others, it not only gives a variety for a player to choose to fit his/her play style, but this opens up the door for Blizzard designers to make mobs, bosses and everything in between different from each other.
For example, if a paladin goes in to tank a raid boss, he will do fine assuming that the player knows his class and how to play it. Now, if the boss happens to have a mana drain ability, the paladin will find himself in trouble since he uses his mana pool for a good portion of keeping aggro. Here is where other tanks come in to play. Any other tanking class that is the second tank can step in and take control of the boss since they do not worry about mana.
For another example, send a warrior, DK or paladin tank in to a fight and they get disarmed, this will pose a large issue, as attacks tend to require that weapon to be in hand. How do you solve this? Send in the bear. You can’t disarm a bear tank. For feral druids, weapons are nothing more then “stat sticks” and are not actually needed to be able to attack.
Now there are many many more examples I could go over, but I think you get the point. Each tank is designed to be able to deal with at least 1 situation far better then any other tank class. It is one of the many ways Blizzard keeps the door open for them to be more and more creative with boss fights.
Below I have put together a little diagram of where some of a tanks strong points are and some of the weak points are. Now keep in mind that this in a normal situation and this does not cover every pro and con.
Warrior Tank: Good at single target tanking as they build up threat quickly in that aspect. They have very good mitigation and damage reduction abilities. However they can struggle generally with AoE tanking so this class would need to work harder to keep aggro on multiple mobs
- Warrior Pros: Shields give a large addition to damage mitigation. Can recover quickly from a knock back with the use of charge. Can use Rallying Cry to temporarily increase the groups health if a fight starts to go wrong. Is totally immune to mana burn since the class does not use mana. Can switch in to berserker or battle stance to dps in a one tank raid boss fight.
- Warrior Cons: If disarmed, makes it almost impossible to generate threat. Must be careful of rotation so as to not run out of rage, no rage and you cannot generate threat.
Paladin Tank: Good at AoE tanking and have some very good damage mitigation abilities and self-heals. However, not as good at single-target tanking compared to all the other classes so you would need to have a good knowledge of a rotation designed for single targets.
- Paladin Pros: Shields give a large addition to damage mitigation. Great ability for initial threat on multiple mobs. If disarmed, can switch to spell casting even tough less effective. Rage is never an issue as the class uses mana instead. Gets a damage buff when dealing damage to undead targets.
- Paladin Cons: Knock backs are hard to over come with the lack of a charge. Mana burn will greatly affect the ability to hold threat on mobs/groups. If silenced, will not be able to use attacks/generate threat on a target.
Death Knight Tanks: Generally are also good at AoE tanking as well as good at single target tanking but do not have as much mitigation as the other classes. This forces this class to rely on spells that help to avoid damage or restore health more then other classes.
- Death Knight Pros: Personal anti-magic shell helps to avoid magic damage, Bone armor act as a bubble reducing over all damage until it is absorbed. Deathgripmana burn as the class does not use mana.
- Death Knight Cons: Does not use a shield and must make up damage mitigation in other ways. Being disarmed will cause a lack in threat generation. Knock backs are harder to over come as the class has no charge. Must carefully balance the use of runic power with available runes or you will end up sitting there waiting for the ability to use attacks.
Druid Tanks: Similar to DK tanks in that they can hold aggro well on AoE and single target tanking. Damage mitigation and avoidance are much different for this class as they only have dodge to focus on instead of dodge and parry.
- Druid Pros: Large health pool and high dodge rate helps greatly in survivability. Immune to polymorph, mind control and mana burns. Has talents to reduce greatly the time feared and knock backs are over come by using charge. Can double as dps on a one tank fight by switching in to cat form.
- Druid Cons: Can be less healer friendly if dodge rating and health pool is not where it should be for content running. Must be careful to not run out of rage or tanking will be impossible.
With all this in mind, remember, trying to be the best tank in the game is a futile effort. Don't try to be the best tank, be the best tank of your class. This is a attainable goal where the other is not. Good luck to all tank out here and keep up the good work. After all, someone has to carry those lazy dps through places, right? (just kidding).
Monday, May 30, 2011
Always remember.....
Today, I'm just gonna make a short post here. Today we celebrate Memorial Day. Take some time to remember those that gave their lives to give you the freedoms you hold so dear.
Always remember that those men and women made the ultimate sacrifice for what they believed in, and for that, we thank them.
Thursday, May 26, 2011
The power of the handy dandy addon....
If you have ever taken a moment to look over the addons on curse.com or wowinterface.com, you have probably been a touch overwhelmed by all the addons that are out there that are supposed to make playing easier in one way or another. With all the addons out there, what are some of the better addons for tanking and all around playing? How do I pick an addon? How will I know if it's any good? These are all valid questions, questions that I hear from guildies all the time. I have taken a my current tanking UI and will break it down as to what I use and why. Maybe this will inform you of an addon that you have been looking for. Maybe you don't run addons and wanna know how they work. This should make things a bit clearer. Here is a screenshot of my current tanking UI:
click image to see a bigger view
Ok, now lets break this down in to its parts. Below is a key.
click image to see a bigger view
1) BasicChatMod: This is a nice little addon to clear up your chat window. It's also nice if you are lazy like I am and hate having to constantly type /o to talk in officer chat. Once you enter a chat channel, you stay there until you enter a new one.
2) Bartender4: This is a very nice way to organize your buttons and make things smoother and easier to organize. Place any number of action bars anywhere on your screen. Also allows you to move around your bags, menu bar and everything else.
3) Skada: This is a nice alternative to Recount. It will show you any information about the fight from dps to threat to CC broken and so on. Can be set for current fight or over all. Since 4.1 dropped, I had nothing but trouble with recount, since I switched to Skada, I've never been happier with a meter since I used DiamondThreatMeter back in BC.
4) SexyMap: This is a nice addon that allows you to move your minimap to anywhere you wish. It also allows you to give it a nice custom look, far nicer then the standard minimap.
5) Raven: This is a buff/debuff display addon. You can create and move bars that show buffs, debuffs, timers and lots of other things. Very handy in helping to keep your UI clean.
6) TitanPanel: This is a nice little bar that sits at the top of your screen, it allows you to display brokers (addons that show things like gold, durability, latency, ect.) and make things far more organized and easier to see at a seconds notice. On TitanPanel, I currently run:
- Currency - This will let you list right on the panel all your currencies, from gold to tokens to points. Also lets you see what you have on other toons by just hovering over it.
- CPU - Let you see what addons are running and how much memory each one is using. This is a great tool, if you are having lag issues suddenly, you can hover over this and see what is going on. See if an addon pulling more then it should.
- DurabilityInfo - The name says it all, lets you know your current gear durability.
- Volumizer - This allows you to adjust the volume for everything ingame. No more having to go in to the sound menu and changing stuff for you.
7) TomTom: This is a simple coordinate addon. It does have nice features such as you can place a "pin" on the map anywhere and you will get an onscreen arrow that will point you the way and how far you are away. Arrow also works for quests that you are tracking as well as trying to find your way back to your corpse.
8) DeadlyBossMod (DBM, not pictured): This is a must have to anyone running anything. It gives you a nice heads up when bosses or mobs are about to do something you should really avoid/interrupt. Also gives you timers for such things as boss enrage timers, time to next cast from boss, even battleground timers.
9) Altoholic (not shown): This addon lets you see what is on your other toons. Now not just what they are wearing, but in their bags, bank, AH and you can also use it to look at your alts professions and even link them in chat without even logging out of your current toon. This is a very handy addon to have.
10) Addon Control Panel: This I HIGHLY recommend. This allows you to look at a list of ALL your addons, on or off. You can turn some on and turn others off, click "reload ui" and POW! no more logging out to turn on or off addons.
11) CBH Viewer: This is what gives me the black gap at the bottom of my screen where all my stuff is. This doe snot just give you a black area, it actually zooms the screen out, giving it a true widescreen feel to it. this also allows you to see more and makes tanking a bit easier.
As you can see, I find that a clean UI is a huge benefit for tanking. The more that you can see, the more control you have on a situation. You will be less likely to be surprised by a stay mob walking around or miss that fire pillar until it hits you.
I hope these help out a bit and do you as much good as they have done for me. Remember, keep up the good work bears! We gotta show them how it's done!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Gemming and reforging feral tanks
One of the best things introduced in to WoW is being able to reforge your gear. Although a great tool, reforging is a bit of a tricky thing. It fine tunes your gear, but the second that your gear changes, it becomes the first thing to change to rebalance everything. I have found through my time as a feral tank that reforging should go in the following order:
Expertise Soft-Cap > Hit > Dodge > Mastery > Crit > Haste
Now, lets make a couple of things more clear, this is the base diagram if you need EVERYTHING. Now, if you are at the expertise soft-cap and are hit capped, then you would start looking at dodge next. Some will tell you that you need to only reforge in to dodge or some will say mastery. My experience has shown me that you will always get the best results by getting that expertise and hit up to where they should be. Remember, if you can't hit them, you can't hold them and all the other stats seem to become meaningless. If you are not where you should be with hit or expertise, always reforge haste or crit in to the needed stat as these are the last stats you will ever need to worry about.
Gems are also a wonderful tool that Blizzard has given us. It really can make all the difference if you add the correct gems to your gear. Gemming should be done in the following priority:
Expertise Soft-Cap, Agility, Stamina, Mastery, Crit, Haste.
You might notice that hit is missing. You should, as a general rule, avoid gemming for hit. You can get this through gear, enchants or reforging. People will argue with me on this order, and I'm ok with that. Everyone is allowed to have an opinion. However, this order is what I have found works the best as a priority list. Remember, if you can't hit them, you can't hold them. Secondly, you will have good amounts of stam on your gear as is, getting your dodge rating up should be the highest next priority next to hit and expertise. You won't need huge amounts of health if the mobs can't hit you.
Now the biggest discussion is always "should I got for the socket bonus?". The answer is yes.....and no. Let me explain, deciding on if you should go for the socket bonus is entirely based on your stats and what you really need. For example, if you are wearing:
Cuirass of Calamitous Fate
Binds when picked up
Chest Leather
1282 Armor
+120 Agility
+180 Stamina
O Yellow Socket
O Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +12 Attack Power
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 80
Item Level 245
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 90 (1.96% @ L80).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 90 (2.74% @ L80).
As a tank, you will most likely be able to make better use of this chest by tossing in agility and stamina gems. You could toss in some multi stat gems to get the bonus, but to be honest the +12 attack power is just very much to make it very useful to a tank as opposed to the stats you'd get some solid color gems and forgetting about the bonus.
However, if you had:
Assassin's Chestplate
Binds when equipped
Chest Leather
1669 Armor
+321 Agility
+512 Stamina
O Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 85
Item Level 359
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 173 (1.44% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 243 (1.36% @ L85).
You will every definitely want to put in an agility gem or expertise gem to get this bonus. The bonus is a sizable plus in a a key tanking stat that it is worth getting.
I hope this helps out and answers some question. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to comment on here and I will asnwer them very quickly.
Remember bears, keep up the good work! We have to show these other tanking classes how it's done!
Expertise Soft-Cap > Hit > Dodge > Mastery > Crit > Haste
Now, lets make a couple of things more clear, this is the base diagram if you need EVERYTHING. Now, if you are at the expertise soft-cap and are hit capped, then you would start looking at dodge next. Some will tell you that you need to only reforge in to dodge or some will say mastery. My experience has shown me that you will always get the best results by getting that expertise and hit up to where they should be. Remember, if you can't hit them, you can't hold them and all the other stats seem to become meaningless. If you are not where you should be with hit or expertise, always reforge haste or crit in to the needed stat as these are the last stats you will ever need to worry about.
Gems are also a wonderful tool that Blizzard has given us. It really can make all the difference if you add the correct gems to your gear. Gemming should be done in the following priority:
Expertise Soft-Cap, Agility, Stamina, Mastery, Crit, Haste.
You might notice that hit is missing. You should, as a general rule, avoid gemming for hit. You can get this through gear, enchants or reforging. People will argue with me on this order, and I'm ok with that. Everyone is allowed to have an opinion. However, this order is what I have found works the best as a priority list. Remember, if you can't hit them, you can't hold them. Secondly, you will have good amounts of stam on your gear as is, getting your dodge rating up should be the highest next priority next to hit and expertise. You won't need huge amounts of health if the mobs can't hit you.
Now the biggest discussion is always "should I got for the socket bonus?". The answer is yes.....and no. Let me explain, deciding on if you should go for the socket bonus is entirely based on your stats and what you really need. For example, if you are wearing:
Cuirass of Calamitous Fate
Binds when picked up
Chest Leather
1282 Armor
+120 Agility
+180 Stamina
O Yellow Socket
O Blue Socket
Socket Bonus: +12 Attack Power
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 80
Item Level 245
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 90 (1.96% @ L80).
Equip: Increases your haste rating by 90 (2.74% @ L80).
As a tank, you will most likely be able to make better use of this chest by tossing in agility and stamina gems. You could toss in some multi stat gems to get the bonus, but to be honest the +12 attack power is just very much to make it very useful to a tank as opposed to the stats you'd get some solid color gems and forgetting about the bonus.
However, if you had:
Assassin's Chestplate
Binds when equipped
Chest Leather
1669 Armor
+321 Agility
+512 Stamina
O Red Socket
Socket Bonus: +10 Agility
Durability 165 / 165
Requires Level 85
Item Level 359
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 173 (1.44% @ L85).
Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 243 (1.36% @ L85).
You will every definitely want to put in an agility gem or expertise gem to get this bonus. The bonus is a sizable plus in a a key tanking stat that it is worth getting.
I hope this helps out and answers some question. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to comment on here and I will asnwer them very quickly.
Remember bears, keep up the good work! We have to show these other tanking classes how it's done!
Monday, May 23, 2011
So you need a good tanking weapon....
With some of the coming changes in patch 4.2, namely, the fact that Blizzard is moving druids away from using strength items. Since these items will no longer hold any real benefit, some people may be a bit confused at to what a good weapon would be for a bear tank.
To ease this transition a little I've created a list of staffs throughout the game, jumping up 10 levels at a time, that would make the best choice for your bear. Lets start at level 15 since that is when you get your bear form now.
At level 15:
To ease this transition a little I've created a list of staffs throughout the game, jumping up 10 levels at a time, that would make the best choice for your bear. Lets start at level 15 since that is when you get your bear form now.
At level 15:
Staff - Befouled Staff
obtain from the quest in Darkshore: A Cure in the Dark
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 19 - 30 Damage Speed 3.10
- (7.8 damage per second)
- +1 Agility
- +2 Stamina
- Durability 45 / 45
- Item Level 11
- Sell Price: 3s 81c
At level 20:
Staff - Staff of the Green Circle
obtain from the lvl20 druid quest
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 46 - 70 Damage Speed 3.30
- (17.6 damage per second)
- +5 Agility
- +7 Stamina
- Durability 75 / 75
- Item Level 20
- Equip: Increases your haste rating by 5 (2.17% @ L20).
- Sell Price: 20s 93c
At level 30:
Staff - Loksey's Training Stick
Boss drop off Houndmaster Loksey in Scarlet Monastery Library
Boss drop off Houndmaster Loksey in Scarlet Monastery Library
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 71 - 108 Damage Speed 3.10
- (29.0 damage per second)
- +14 Agility
- +7 Stamina
- Durability 100 / 100
- Requires Level 29
- Item Level 34
- Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 5 (0.88% @ L29).
At level 40:
Staff - Chillwind Staff
Obtained from the quest in Western Plaguelands: Alas, Andorhal
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 94 - 142 Damage Speed 3.30
- (35.7 damage per second)
- +12 Agility
- +15 Stamina
- Durability 100 / 100
- Item Level 40
- Equip: Increases your haste rating by 8 (1.39% @ L38).
At level 50:
Staff - Slavedriver's Cane
Boss drop off Ramstein the Gorger in Stratholme (servants gate/live side)
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 110 - 166 Damage Speed 3.00
- (45.9 damage per second)
- +16 Agility
- +16 Stamina
- Durability 100 / 100
- Requires Level 48
- Item Level 53
- Equip: Increases your hit rating by 16 (2.22% @ L48).
At level 60:
Staff - Ursol's Claw
Random chance to drop from the Reinforced Fel Iron Lockbox located at the end of Hellfire Ramparts Dungeon.
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 165 - 249 Damage Speed 3.00
- (68.9 damage per second)
- +27 Agility
- +52 Stamina
- Durability 100 / 100
- Requires Level 60
- Item Level 85
At level 70:
Staff - Terestian's Stranglestaff
Random chance to drop off Terestian Illhoof: Karazhan (10 man BC raid)
- Binds when picked up
- Unique
- Two-Hand Staff
- 273 - 411 Damage Speed 3.00
- (114.0 damage per second)
- +37 Agility
- +79 Stamina
- Durability 120 / 120
- Requires Level 70
- Item Level 115
- Equip: Increases your hit rating by 25 (1.69% @ L70).
OR...for non-raid drop weapon...
Staff - Fleshling Simulation Staff
Quest Reward from Netherstorm: Nexus-King Salhadaar
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 167 - 252 Damage Speed 2.40
- (87.5 damage per second)
- +27 Agility
- +51 Stamina
- Durability 100 / 100
- Item Level 109
- Equip: Increases your hit rating by 26 (1.96% @ L68).
- Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 17 (5.13 @ L68).
At level 80:
Staff - Origin of Nightmares
Chance to drop off Grobbulus and Gluth: Naxxramas (25 man)
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 391 - 587 Damage Speed 2.40
- (203.7 damage per second)
- 204 Armor
- +100 Agility
- +199 Stamina
- Durability 120 / 120
- Requires Level 80
- Item Level 213
OR, for non-raid drop.....
Staff - Staff of Trickery
Chance to drop off Cyanigosa: Violet Hold (heroic)
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 358 - 538 Damage Speed 2.40
- (186.6 damage per second)
- +89 Agility
- +201 Stamina
- Durability 120 / 120
- Requires Level 80
- Item Level 200
At level 85:
Staff - Malevolence
Chance to drop off Halfus Wyrmbreaker: The Bastion of Twilight (10man normal)
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 1196 - 1796 Damage Speed 2.40
- (623.3 damage per second)
- +341 Agility
- +512 Stamina
- Durability 120 / 120
- Requires Level 85
- Item Level 359
- Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 228 (1.27% @ L85).
- Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 228 (1.27 @ L85).
OR, for non-raid drop....
Staff - Jin'do's Verdict
Chance to drop off Jin'do The Godbreaker
- Binds when picked up
- Two-Hand Staff
- 1556 - 2335 Damage Speed 3.30
- (589.4 damage per second)
- +323 Agility
- +484 Stamina
- Durability 120 / 120
- Requires Level 85
- Item Level 353
- Equip: Increases your critical strike rating by 215 (1.20% @ L85).
- Equip: Increases your mastery rating by 215 (1.20 @ L85).
Now I know what some of you are saying out there. "But I really like to use polearms.". Well, that is all well and good, but since there are more staffs then polearms in game as a whole, it's generally best to focus on what will be over all easier to obtain. Now this list is not the end all be all of list, there are staffs out there that are rare world drops (Braxxis' Staff of Slumber) and other items that you may come across that will work better for you. This is simply a list of very good tanking weapons that are relatively easy to obtain and will easily get you through your next 10 levels.
Remember, keep up the good work bears! We have to teach these other tanking classes how it's done!
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to comment and I will respond quickly. If you enjoy this blog, don't be afraid to become a follower.
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